FOOD IS A
RIGHT, NOT A PRIVILEGE Sharing food with the hungry is an unregulated
act of kindness. Rescind all laws restricting compassion.
ARRESTS COULD START IN PHILADELPHIA THIS MONTH - HOUSTON COULD START TO ARREST VOLUNTEERS IN JULY

"I wholeheartedly support the action to protest
laws against sharing food!" Dr. Cornel West - author and
professor Princeton University

"THERE IS NO RIGHT WAY TO GIVE OUT FOOD, THERE IS ONLY GIVING OUT
ALL THE FOOD YOU CAN" Kathy Mitro who posted a
petition on line after being threatened with arrest for sharing
food in Daytona Beach. Florida in January 2012

Food Not Bombs is organizing a global campaign to support the right to share food with the hungry in public.
Food Not Bombs volunteers and local church groups facing arrest in Philadelphia starting this Friday, June 8, 2012.
Houston is set to arrest our volunteers this July. Food Not Bombs volunteers are also being arrested for sharing meals in Minsk, Belarus.
If you live near any of these three cities please consider joining us by risking arrest or volunteer to cook or help as a support person.
The list of cities facing new laws against sharing meals in public is growing. Let us know if there has been any efforts to ban the sharing of meals
in your community.

Another way we can prepare for the arrests is to
organize an affinity group. Please visit our AFFINITY GROUP PAGE to learn more.
If you can not go to Minsk, Philadelphia or Houston please organize a solidarity meal in your community. Let your local media know why you are organizing your action.

We are proposing that people all over the world consider sharing free
meals in celebration our right to food and participate in our campaign
for an end to laws restricting acts of compassion. Celebrate our right
to feed the hungry with music, theater, and the sharing of food. The city of Philadelphia may start to arrest our volunteers on June 8, 2012.
The Houston law takes effect on July 1, 2012.

It has been distressing to receive so
many reports in the past few weeks of people being threatened with
arrest or cities adopting new laws limiting people's right to share free
food with the public. People in Belarus, England, California, Texas,
Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Florida have been contacting the Food
Not Bombs global coordination office about having been threatened with
arrest for sharing food. Others report that their local governments are
considering laws to limit acts of compassion. Food Not Bombs volunteers
in Minsk have been arrested for sharing meals an police raided a benefit
concert on March 24, 2012 charging 15 volunteers with sentenced to
administrative arrests.

This new wave of
threats is happening as half of all Americans are struggling to survive.
The Department of Agriculture's February report shows that
46,286,294 people relied on food stamps in November of 2011. People have
been arriving at Food Not Bombs meals claiming they had not eaten in
four days because other food programs had exhausted their resources. The
Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 1 in 7 people or 925
million people world wide went hungry in 2010. We are announcing a
global campaign to recognize that sharing food with the hungry is an
unregulated activity of compassion and should not be interfered with by
the authorities.

The public is encouraged to share meals with their community on Friday,
June 1, 2012 to celebrate our right to share food and end all efforts
to restrict acts of compassion.

ENDORSED BY

Barbara Ehrenreich - author of Nickel and Dimed

Dr. Cornel West - author and professor Princeton University

Noam Chomsky - author and professor M.I.T.

Michael Parenti
- author and lecturer

Raj Patel - author of Stuffed
and Starved

Eric Holt-Giménez - Food First/Institute
for Food and Development Policy

Bill McKibben - author Deep
Economy

David Barsamian - founder and director of
Alternative Radio

David Rovics - Musician, USA

Kevin Devine - Musician, Brooklyn, NY

Dorinda Moreno -
Fuerza Mundial Collaborative

Rev. Brian Burch - President,
St. Clare's Multifaith Housing Society

Francisca James
Hernández, Ph.D. - Southwest Institute for Research on Women

Kathy Kelly - Co-coordinator, Voices for Creative
Nonviolence

Max Ventura - Musician, Activist, Mom, USA

Michele Burke - St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada

Rabbi.
Auri V. Ish - Musician, Nederland Colorado

Christina
Persaud - Halifax Nova Scotia

Can Baskent - Practical
Anarchy, New York City

Planting Justice - Oakland, CA

KT Terry - Founder Homeless Not Hopeless Poets For Change

Marian Wagner - The North Country Coalition for Justice and
Peace, East Ryegate, Vermont

As the global economy faces a growing crisis
more families are seeking food. A war with Iran and economic crisis on
the Euro Zone could bring about another Great Depression increasing food
prices causing even more need to share food with the hungry. Government
claims that people are required to raise tens of thousands of dollars to
rent, renovate and pay for permits is an obstacle to most Americans to
sharing food with the hungry. Food banks, church soup kitchens and
shelters are already unable to meet the need often turning away as many
as 15 to 20 percent of those seeking their support. Congress is
threatening to cut the Food Stamp Program to cut government costs.
Everyone regardless of income should have the right to help those
needing food. It is clear that organizations that can afford to meet the
costly government restrictions are not interested in helping feed the
hungry. Learn more on this issue and join us in ending all restrictions
to compassion. Thank you so much for your support.

SAMPLE STATE LAW PROTECTING THE RIGHT OF ALL TO SHARE FOOD WITHOUT
REGULATION Connecticut General Statute 19A-36 was changed on
October 3, 2009

According to Peter Goselin, one of the lawyers for Food Not Bombs,
"the amended state statute not only protects free distribution of
food to people who need it in Connecticut, but should be viewed as a
model for other states to follow so that faith-based and civic
organizations can do what is needed. This is particularly important
given news released today that one in six Americans now live in
poverty."*

Houston Food Not Bombs has been sharing healthy vegetarian food with
hundreds of hungry people, several nights a week, for over 18 years and
is a 2011 Recipient of a Peacemaker Award from the Houston Peace and
Justice Center.

Well funded Houston homeless service
organizations, developers, and city officials are promoting new
regulations for dozens of groups like ours that provide food for the
homeless in Houston every week.

Wednesday March 7, at the 9am
session, Houston City Council will consider amending chapter 20 of the
code of ordinances, imposing five new regulatory and licensing
requirements for those who feed hungry people in Houston. These
regulations would bring the work of non-professionals who do homeless
service work under city and police purview. This law fits squarely in
the context of criminalization of sharing of food across the country.
Food Not Bombs participants in U.S. Cities have ended up in jail when
restrictive new laws came into effect.

We need your help! Here
are some talking points:
- volunteer groups provide absolutely essential services to hungry
people- imposing new laws will cause volunteers to be fined and arrested
- small community and religious organizations do not have the same
resources or grants to do their work, they are not full time paid
employees who have the resources to jump through regulatory hurdles -
homelessness is not a crime, nor is helping the homeless

1)
Circulate this email: We need religious groups, and others doing
important work to make their calls to the City Council members Monday
and Tuesday.

2) Come to City Council Tuesday March 6th to speak to City Council about
this. Call Monday to register with the City Secretary: (832) 393 1100
and ask for 1 minute to speak (do not ask for 3 minutes).

3)
Call and email your city council members:

Helena Brown, 832.393.3010, districta@houstontx.gov

Jerry Davis, 832.393.3009, districtb@houstontx.gov

Ellen Cohen,
832.393.3004, districtc@houstontx.gov

Wanda Adams, 832.393.3001,
districtd@houstontx.gov

Mike Sullivan, 832.393.3008,
districte@houstontx.gov

Al Hoang, 832.393.3002,
districtf@houstontx.gov

Oliver Pennington, 832.393.3007, districtg@houstontx.gov

Ed
Gonzalez, 832.393.3003, districth@houstontx.gov

James G. Rodriguez,
832.393.3011, districti@houstontx.gov

Mike Laster, 832.393.3015,
districtj@houstontx.gov

Larry Green, 832.393.3016,
districtk@houstontx.gov

Stephen C. Costello, 832.393.3014, atlarge1@houstontx.gov

Andrew C. Burks, Jr., 832.393.3013, atlarge2@houstontx.gov

Melissa Noriega, 832.393.3005, atlarge3@houstontx.gov

C.O.
"Brad" Bradford, 832.393.3012, atlarge4@houstontx.gov

Jack Christie, 832.393.3017, atlarge5@houstontx.gov

4) Come out to a sharing at 521 Lamar St., 77002 (The Houston Downtown
Public Library Courtyard) on Mon., Wed., & Fri. at 8pm, and Sunday at
7pm. Bring vegan food to share or just bring yourself!

read the Houston City Council agenda here:
read the Houston Chronicle Commentary here:

Santa Monica City
Council plans to vote on a new law requiring groups to get a permit to
share meals with 75 or more people. At the same time they a similar
Community Bill of Rights ordinance that we are using to support the
right to share food without regulation. The community is encouraged to
contact the Santa Monica City Council before the Tuesday, February 21,
2012 meeting and ask them not to pass the Gathering Permits law. Thanks
Gathering permits Gatherings including more than 75 people on the
Third Street Promenade will need to get a permit in the future after the
City Council took its first vote on an ordinance changing the permitting
rules. Staff cited space constraints and safety as reasons for the
change. Previously, it took over 150 people to require a permit.

MORE ON THE HISTORY OF EFFORTS TO RESTRICT THE SHARING OF
FOOD WITH THE HUNGRY

The first arrest for sharing food in Orlando, Florida

In June 2011 the
police made 24 arrested for sharing vegan meals to the hungry in
Orlando, Florida. Because we were able to build so much support the
mayor agreed to end the arrests and dropped all charges against the
volunteers. Resistence ends the attacks on Food Not Bombs. People all
over the world organized meals in solidarity with Orlando Food Not
Bombs. To read more on the case in Orlando, Florida we are providing
these links.

On April 12, 2011 the Eleventh Circuit Court of
Appeals ruled
that the City of Orlando could limit Food Not Bombs right to share
information and food to the public to twice a year per park.

Please consider organizing a meal with music and
other cultural activities on April, 1,2012. Invite your local media to
the action and let them know you are part of a global campaign to end
laws restricting the right to share free meals with the hungry. Please
email us the details of your local action to post on the website. When
the police were making arrests in Orlando, Florida people organized
meals and actions calling for the right to feed the hungry. This is just
a tiny example of the global effort. Thanks

Hey Friends and Supporters, On Friday, May 8, 2009, Food Not Bombs
Albuquerque was notified that we are facing an injunction in court to
stop sharing food anywhere that the state of New Mexico requires a
permit. The motion filed by the New Mexico Environment Department cites
Mike Butler, Patrick Jaite, and Several Unidentified Members of FNB as
"John Does", as defendents. We are currently going to be talking
with lawyers and figuring out what our next step is. We are still
looking for any lawyer that will do pro-bono work to defend us. (our
contact info will be below).Please spread the word about the repression
that is happening and know that we will continue to share food to all
that are hungry. Sincerely, Food Not Bombs Albuquerque fnb_505@yahoo.com
and leave a message for us @ (505) 842-5697